a paragraph on THE INVISIBLE MAN

1933’s THE INVISIBLE MAN 
(What an incredible movie poster!)

Where viewed: DVD, couch, a can of Carling Black Label beer. (It’s not good beer.)
Experience with film: I have a nostalgic love for the Universal monster movies. As a kid, I’d pair the actor with the monster before falling asleep. Lon Chaney is the Phantom of the Opera. Long Chaney Jr. is the Wolf Man. Boris Karloff is Frankenstein. Bela Lugosi is Dracula. And so on. I can’t remember why. Because kids are weird. Anyway, I hadn’t seen this one in a long long time.

Writer: R.C. Sherriff; based on the H.G. Wells novel.
Director: James Whale
Principal Actors: Claude Rains, Gloria Stuart, William Harrigan

Last week, my girlfriend and I tried to get through a distracted double feature of James Whale’s other monster movie smashes, 1931’s FRANKENSTEIN and 1935’s THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN. It didn’t go so well. Perhaps we didn’t give them a fair enough shake (the danger of home viewing). Or perhaps the pokey and fairly cheap-looking FRANKENSTEIN didn’t reflect my memory of the film, thus deflating the evening a bit (there isn’t even an Igor in it! The character’s name is Fritz). But my what a leap James Whale makes with THE INVISIBLE MAN, which came out just two years later. There’s no narrative waste in R.C. Sherriff’s script. No plodding origin story–the Invisible Man is already invisible and on the precipice of his rampage. And we get into the effects, violence, and black humor right away. That last bit, the dark humor, is what keeps the film from feeling dated. Propelled by the symphonic voice of Claude Rains (in his Hollywood debut) as an (often totally) invisible character, THE INVISIBLE MAN is grim, violent and maniacal fun. Driven mad by the chemical cocktail that’s rendered him invisible, the once respectable Dr. Jack Griffin devolves from swatting a lunch tray out of someone’s hand to murdering a policeman with a stool to launching a train off a cliff, killing a hundred people. But he also steals another cop’s pants and skips up the road in them–so there’s just a pair of trousers dancing around and singing nursery rhymes. He tweaks people’s noses. He throws hats into ponds. The Invisible Man is clearly mad, and probably evil, but he’s joyful and rageful and confident. He’s having a damn good time. A seductive villain. An anti-hero that, if you removed the camp and fun-ness and made him “gritty”, would fit in with the Sons of Breaking Bad Walking Mad Men roster of nu-golden era TV protagonists. He’s such a likably unlikable guy. There’s a moment toward the end when the Invisible Man kills his former partner by tying him up and pushing his car off a cliff. And I was rooting for it. Get that disloyal cowardly sucker! Then I realized how pulled into the story I was, how the movie had twisted me up as only movies can. The Invisible Man had broken into his partner’s house, forced him to become an accomplice to murder and mayhem on the threat of death, and then when his partner had the gall to call the police, the Invisible Man pursued an irritational vendetta against him. And I was cheering it on! Because it was fun. The film sits at this rare nexus of lightweight/savage/humorous/heavy/hopeful/nihilistic that rests somewhere under the umbrella of “dark humor”. In order to get to this rare place, everyone has be on board, the creatives and the technicians, with making the same movie because the target is so small. Either that or it’s just a wonderful thrilling accident.

a paragraph on PSYCHO

1960’s PSYCHO

Where viewed: DVD, TV, couch.
Experience with film: This film has been in my consciousness since I was like six and my dad claimed that he and my sister stayed at the Bates Motel on a trip to South Carolina. Oh boy I love Hitchcock. The first movie I saw on the big screen at the Normal Theater was VERTIGO when I was 10. Saw a raft of Hitchcock classics there, including PSYCHO. Seen it on TV a few times. Saw the Gus Van Zant “remake” at some point as well too.

Writer: Joseph Stefano
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Principal Actors: Anthony Perkins, Vera Miles, Janet Leigh

There’s so much to talk about with PSYCHO. Minor shit like Anthony Hopkins’s junky turn as the Master of Suspense in 2012’s HITCHCOCK and the rumor that this is first film to feature a flushing toilet in America. From major shit like the introduction of this level of sex and violence in mainstream American film (how tame it all looks now). Bernard Herrmann’s incredible score. Killing the “star” halfway through. But on this viewing, what stood out most was the overall pacing of the movie, particularly the difference between the number of cuts during typical scenes overall versus the number of cuts in the famous shower scene. Compared to what we’re used to as movie-goers today, the bulk of PSYCHO moves at a creeping pace shot-wise. Hitchcock is content to let his camera run unblinking during conversations, while people are driving, while vehicles are moving in and out of locations. I can’t pull up any specific data on the movie as a whole (although there is a website devoted to Average Shot Length in movies that is initially not-real-helpful). But there are far fewer cuts than most movies today, especially the disorienting SFX-centered contemporary actioners. But it speeds up significantly during that shower scene. In hindsight, it’s easily to discern why there are so many cuts in this scene. It provides a visual accompaniment to the shrieking violin score. It gives Hitch the ability to create a scene of great violence without any actual violence by providing enough visual information that your brain fills in the punctures and viscera on its own. Smoke and mirrors. It’s a jagged, unsettling stretch of hyperactive film. It works. Choose your reason. But that scene represents a huge spike in camera activity in the film–reportedly 78 camera set-ups and seven days to film. And it’s not like the rest of the film. Contrast it with this scene of Arbogast’s murder. These shaggy, longish shots build tension, but they don’t release it in a frenzy like the shower scene. They’re staid by comparison, less frenetic. Less of a shock to the system. Less of a look into the future.

a paragraph on THE PURGE

2013’s THE PURGE

Where viewed: DVD, laptop, bed.
Experience with movie: None, and I typically don’t seek out these recent-vintage low budget, high concept horror flicks.

Writer: James DeMonaco
Director: James DeMonaco
Principal Actors: Ethan Hawke, Lena Headey, Max Burkholder

The setup: for 12 hours every year, all crime is legal in America. An upper class white family tries to stay safe in their locked-down McMansion, but stupidly gets entangled in this annual bloodletting. The concept of the film has the potential for commentary on class division, crime and morality, and American consumerism. One of the great things about genre films is their ability to carry a social message without embarrassing CRASH-like on-the-nosed-ness. Well. Outside of a few superficial shrugs in their direction, THE PURGE pretty much lets these opportunities slip away. And that’s fine. Social commentary isn’t a requirement for an enjoyable horror flick. Skipping over the shockless and surpriseless plot, the horrendous camerawork is the most stink-worthy part of the movie. The overabundance of headache-inducing closeups and odd framing choices (like obscuring 3/4 of the shot with the back of someone’s out-of-focus head during conversation scenes) makes the act of watching THE PURGE awkward and uncomfortable. Not in an artistically pleasing way, like how sitting through the super long takes of a mid-century Japanese movie initially irritates our hyperactive 21st century brains before letting the beauty of slow-paced long shots seep in. But in a there’s-an-eyelash-caught-under-my-contact-lens-oh-god-get-it-out kind of way. Perhaps the director and/or the rookie cinematographer Jacques Jouffret were trying to suggest claustrophobia or the isolation of our foolish protagonist family. Perhaps they were trying to as much brand name actor face onscreen in their low budget flick. But these shot selections disrupt the visual rhythm of scenes in a hugely clumsy way and, perhaps more importantly, they rob the viewer of spatial context and awareness of the setting. Since the movie descends into a “protect the fort” story in the grand tradition of HOME ALONE and STRAW DOGS, we need to have at least a passable understanding of the McMansion’s geography. We don’t. And once the masked bad dudes inexplicably cut off the McMansion’s power, all the characters may as well have been swinging their axes and bad dialogue while floating in a black void. Which is where I’ll be sending this DVD.

a paragraph on DRACULA UNTOLD

Where viewed: Matinee showing at the multiplex. No one else in the theater. No one. Took this rare opportunity to loudly discuss the film in progress.
Experience with film: I have a soft spot from Dracula since watching the Bela Lugosi class as a kid (“I don’t drink… wine.”) but knew virtually nothing about this until I saw it in the listing.

Writer: Matt Sazama, Burk Sharpless
Director: Gary Shore
Principal Actors: Luke Evans, a pouty Sarah Gadon, a strongly miscast Dominic Cooper

I’m not going to talk about how Vlad/Dracula’s magical powers aren’t bound by coherent rules (this type of this is a huge pet peeve of mine–here’s a look at 2010’s THE WOLFMAN for more). Nor am I going to talk about how Luke Evans seems trapped in terrible SFX/action movie purgatory (IMMORTALS, CLASH OF THE TITANS, FAST AND THE FURIOUS). Nor am I going to talk about the lame franchise-grab ending. Or even the nice little SEVENTH SEAL costume allusion. What I want to talk about is making your protagonist an imbecile so you can include action set pieces. I understand that big budget SFX/action movies need flashy set pieces because they need big trailer moments because they need to have huge opening weekends to even begin to recoup their costs. But, and maybe I’m totally batshit crazy here, I don’t think you should give those set pieces such precedence that in order to make them happen, you don’t mind making the hero of your story seem like he’s operating a nine-volt brain with a AAA battery. The setup, briefly. Vlad/Dracula makes a Faustian bargain to gain otherworldly vampiric powers so he can single-handedly save his country from the rampaging Turkish army. Important info: 1) He gets a three-day grace period in which he can use these powers without turning into a vampire if he can resist drinking human blood. 2) He can only use his powers at night. 3) When using his (essentially god-like) powers, he can lay waste to hundreds and THOUSANDS of soldiers in an incredibly brief span. 4) He can travel long distances very quickly. 5) The Turkish army is already invading his country. Let’s do some plot calculus here. Our protagonist’s goal, the sole and entire reason he risks turning vampiric, is to defeat the Turkish army and save his country. With these powers, he is an invincible, army-killing force. In a GONE GIRL-style quiz, would Vlad/Dracula then: A) as soon as he gets his powers, destroy the Turkish army, saving his country; B) as soon as he gets his powers, destroy the Turkish army, saving his country; C) kill a few guys, then lead his people on a doomed march to their cliffside fortress, pick fights with peasants, watch his buddies die, sit at the cliffside fortress awhile, squander all three nights of superpowers, then decide to attack the Turkish army when he has approximately 4 minutes of superpowers left, ensuring failure; or D) as soon as he gets his powers, destroy the Turkish army, saving his country. Obviously, he picks C)! Because he is a moron. Or, more accurately, because having a third act battle ripping off Helm’s Deep is more important than having anything make sense. This is shit. It treats the audience’s intelligence with the same disdain that it treats Vlad/Dracula’s. It insists that spectacle is the point. Not story. Not character. But worst of all, this situation is avoidable. There are other ways to back Vlad/Dracula into a corner where he has 4 minutes to try to defeat the Turkish army. Perhaps by not making his powers god-like. That’s the easiest fix. If he’s merely super-strong and needs the security of his cliffside fortress and the strength of his own people fighting with him, then it starts to make sense. If he’s invincible and just decides not to do the one single thing he set out to do, then he is a fool and why would I, as the viewer, give one spoonful of guano about him or his pain or, Bram Stoker forbid, a sequel. I don’t.

 

a paragraph on THE WITCHES

Where viewed: standard def DVD on the couch
Experience with Film: didn’t even know it existed–read the book as a kid, didn’t remember much of it

Writer: Allan Scott
Director: Nicolas Roeg
Principal Actors: Anjelica Huston, Mai Zetterling, Jasen Fisher

Ungentle children’s movies are the best. Stories that don’t condescend, have real stakes, and are a little brutal. This is definitely one of those films. Roald Dahl meets Labyrinth-esque Jim Henson with a vamping Anjelica Huston, terrible child actors, and a lot of shots of mice running around cleverly constructed sets. And it’s unsparingly violent despite it’s PG rating. Quick synopsis: witches exist, disguised, around the world. They hate children and plan to dispose of them. All of them. At a sort of witch conference at a seaside hotel, the Grand High Witch (Huston) hatches a plan to turn all of England’s children into mice using a magic potion. She tests the potion on our dullard of a red-headed protagonist and his fat friend. It works. BUT, with the help of a German (?) grandmother, all the witches are tricked into ingesting the potion, turning them all into mice instead. And then the hotel patrons and staff begin MURDERING THE WITCH-MICE. At one point, the hotel manager, played by Mr. Bean, starts brandishing a bloody meat cleaver. Bloody from murdering witch-mice. This scene is in addition to Anjelica Huston trying to push a baby off a cliff, Anjelica Huston stomping on one of her mice-witch minions which is accompanied with a fart sound and green goo splattering all over, and probably the most harrowing part of the film, which is when our now-mousified protagonist says he doesn’t mind being vermin and then asks his grandmother how long mice live. Not long, buddy. Nothing like staring into the ceaseless void to warm a child’s heart. But this kind of bleakness makes the story memorable. The world isn’t always a comfortable place–it can be dangerous, unfair, and cruel. It’s a shame the movie got a deus ex machina ending where our dullard red-headed hero gets changed back into a kid. Hollywood happy strikes again.

a paragraph on THE HAPPENING

Where Viewed: standard def DVD on the couch
Experience with Film: I remembered the shot of people laying down in front of a lawnmower from the trailer. And maybe that the bad guys required chlorophyll to survive.

Writer: M. Night Shyamalan
Director: M. Night Shyamalan
Principal Actors: Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel

Is this the point when M. Night Shyamalan became a punchline? I couldn’t tell whether THE HAPPENING is meant to be humorous or scary. It fails at both. I read a CNN interview with M. Knight in which he claims that it’s not an environmental movie, that it’s a B-movie, but it’s also about “if you realize that in 30 seconds you were gonna die … what will you say to your loved one in that last moment?” Which is not really B-movie material. And if this is what the movie’s about, I sure didn’t get it. While watching it, my girlfriend joked that they shot the whole thing in a weekend because none of the actors seem to even be trying to emote. In fact, early on, Zooey Deschanel’s character actually says that she doesn’t like to show her emotions. Between that cop out and Marky Mark’s perpetually raised eyebrows, the actors aren’t doing much besides walking through fields. If I remember correctly, characters in Shyamalan movies often veer into deadpan—and it seems like a stylistic choice. But it doesn’t work here. In that CNN interview, M. Night claims that THE HAPPENING is intense, that it’s “breathless from the second the movie starts to the end”. He is woefully mistaken. It’s a chase movie with dull protagonists that are running from trees. And the wind. And trees blowing in the wind. It’s awful hard to generate intensity when the characters are either one-note or blank-faced. And the antagonists are plants. And are are in almost every shot of the movie. And are plants. And the protagonists don’t really have a goal–they’re just wandering around and have almost no control of their fate. Toward the end, the trees release their suicidal spores randomly and then they stop inexplicably. That’s it. There is no satisfying climax. There is no intensity. It’s not even a fun B-movie.

a paragraph: UP

Where Viewed: On DVD, at home.
Experience with Film: I LOVE THIS MOVIE

Writer: Pete Docter and Bob Peterson
Director: Pete Docter and Bob Peterson
Principal (Voice) Actors: Ed Asner, Jordan Nagai

What I want to talk about every time I see UP is the montage that covers the decades of Carl and Ellie’s marriage from the bloom-of-youth nuptials to Ellie’s decline, death, and Carl’s subsequent estrangement from the world. I’ve used it in every screenwriting course I’ve taught. I openly cry when I watch it. A beautiful example of visual storytelling. But that’s not what I’m going to talk about here. Instead, let’s look at the two (Nearly) Unforgivable Cliches that UP manages to brush off. The first is Corkboard of Craziness; the second is the Air Vent Escape. This former is used to reveal a character’s obsession or unhinged nature by showing a cork board filled with pictures and news clippings connected via red yarn or marker lines. We see this when disgraced explorer Charles Muntz expositions through his experiences with The Bird, telling us that she lives in the stone labyrinth. The latter is one of the most overused, laughable devices in all movie-dom. The hero, attempting to escape immediate danger or desiring to break into/out of an impregnable fortress or needing to stealthily explore an interior, simply locates the nearest air vent, climbs in, and exits to safety (or the secret control room). Kinda like the Whistle Warp in Mario 3. In UP, our heroes use a convenient air vent to escape pursuit by Muntz’s canine minion in the dirigible. Both (Nearly) Unforgivable Cliches are groaners. But UP manages to avoid the greasy stink of cliches by barely making them plot points. The movie devotes maybe 12 seconds total to them both–it doesn’t dwell on them, it doesn’t give the audience time to register that they’re there. Usually filmmakers draw attention to these cliches by making them seem clever or revelatory, whereas UP uses them as brief throwaway devices to impart a small piece of information and maintain a breakneck pace, respectively.

a paragraph on MARIE ANTOINETTE

Where viewed: standard def DVD on the couch
Experience with Film(s): I remember rumblings about it a few years ago. My girlfriend once watched it four times in a loop as a panacea to not-happiness.

Writer: Sofia Coppola
Director: Sofia Coppola
Principal Actors: Kirsten Dunst

An aesthetic confection of a movie that revels in costuming, make-up-ing, set decorating, and culinary art. And anachronisms. And the total disregard of accent accuracy. And why not? It’s fun. Amidst all the incredibly rich and detailed design of the film, the most humanizing element is, oddly, the camera. Whereas everything else is impeccable and touched up, the camera often has little stumbling moves as it pans and tilts and zooms. And it often captures the characters stumbling or being a touch sloppy in their own movements. It was most striking at the beginning when Jason Schwartzman’s Louis XVI waits for his future bride to appear at the French-Austrian border. In a long shot, he and two of his buddies horsing around and walk through the woods. The camera trips along following them; Schwartzman trips on a root. It’s a funny moment with human characters. This doesn’t happen all of the time. And, when the camera is static, it’s often recording painterly compositions. In a movie drenched in almost unrelenting opulence, the little humanizing stumbles are welcome.

a paragraph: LIBERAL ARTS and HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR

 

Where viewed: DVDs on the couch
Experience with Film(s): none, except an echoing clamor about the “classic-ness” of the latter somewhere in my brain

LIBERAL ARTS
Writer: Josh Radnor
Director: Josh Radnor
Principal Actors: Josh Radnor, Elizabeth Olsen

HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR
Writer: Marguerite Duras
Director: Alain Resnais
Principal Actors: Emmanuelle Riva, Eiji Okada

Let’s be upfront here: I didn’t finish either of these movies. I saw about forty minutes of LIBERAL ARTS and about twenty-five minutes of HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR. So this paragraph isn’t about a total viewing of either. This paragraph is about not viewing. It’s hard to get a total viewing (a term coined out of convenience, at this moment) when you’re on the couch and any number of distractions could do their distracting best: text messages, the need to join in hurling sarcastic comments at the screen with girlfriend, seeing a squirrel out the window, etc. The convenience of home viewing doesn’t usually yield the best viewing experience. Not only because of the aforementioned distractions, but also the distraction of choice. The next (presumably) awesome movie is only a brief buffer away! And the next! We don’t have the internet where we’re currently staying, so we can’t even drown in the Netflix/Hulu choice whirlpool, but we still have a hair-trigger DVD eject button. And we use it. But I ejected these movies for completely different reasons: LIBERAL ARTS wasn’t challenging enough and HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR was too challenging. The first forty minutes of LIBERAL ARTS holds no surprises, nothing to chew on, no sense of wonder. The plot line as follows: unhappy main character (crap job/breakup) returns “home” and meets quirky character that shakes them out of the doldrums. Main character resumes joy of living. Etcetera etcetera with gentle indie rock music over a montage, probably. Yawn. Does this film not exist in endless iterations already? Perhaps something amazing happens after the forty minute mark–perhaps a chariot race or a Bollywood dance number or an attack on the Death Star. But why wait around to find out when HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR is right there, glinting with promise and artiness in its Criterion packaging? I didn’t. And I was rewarded with all the artiness and challenge I could handle. A long opening montage of documentary scenes of devastated Hiroshima post-Little Boy interspersed with shots of a woman’s hand clutching a man’s back. Cryptic and repetitive dialogue. In French. My phone buzzed intently: an out-of-the-blue text from an old friend. The hour was late. The girlfriend was asleep. Dialogue floated past my uncomprehending ears while my eyes were occupied. I called it a night. Eject. Will I give HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR another shot? Yes. And with a better effort. Some movies demand an effort, and I suspect I’ll be rewarded with this film. LIBERAL ARTS drifted too firmly into ManicPixieDreamGirl/QuarterLifeCrisis Land and, unless I use it for my Indie Road Trip Movie Drinking Bingo game, it’s going back to the library.

a paragraph: GONE GIRL

Where viewed: Holland 7 Theater, opening night, which I never do.
Experience with Film: read book recently, first time viewing.
Spoiler Alert: Of course. And if you haven’t read the novel, this might be less interesting for you.

Writer: Gillian Flynn
Director: David Fincher
Principal Actors: Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike

Going into the movie, I had no hope that it could capture the expansive interior of the characters as developed in the novel. I wasn’t looking for that despite Gillian Flynn adapting her own novel–screenplays are an entirely different beast what with their focus on action and exteriority and visuals. Rather than looking for an “accurate” adaptation, I was curious about what/how Flynn would adapt. What would she streamline, cut, alter, emphasize in order to transform her nerve-fraying novel into a big-budget Hollywood feature? (Thus it would be disingenuous to pretend that I watched GONE GIRL in a critical vacuum. If there is such thing. There’s not.) Let’s talk about Ben Affleck. Both physically and his character. I was struck by the top-heaviness of Mr. Affleck. A buoyant coiffure atop a massive head that settles, neckless, onto broad shoulders. The thick simian dangle of the arms. Hunched and beefy. This is where the potential violence and menace of Nick Dunne rests. Not in action (aside from a shove at the end) or dialogue. As written by Gillian Flynn, directed by David Fincher, and acted by Ben Affleck, movie Nick Dunne is the hero. Novel Nick Dunne simmers with rage, confusion, hatred. On the inside. In his head. Movie Nick Dunne gets the hunched simian potential violence of Ben Affleck’s physique. It’s not laid bare. My experience with novel Nick Dunne is regarding him as a shit, a damaged shit just barely holding back his fists of misogyny. It’s disappointing and exhausting and perfect when he rejoins with Amy at the end of the book. Movie Nick is an inherently good, if disloyal and imperfect, man caught in his evil wife’s sick web. He seems to rejoin her out of paternal duty to his unborn child rather than realizing his monstrosity matches Amy’s. Movie Nick is doing the decent difficult thing, whereas novel Nick throws decency out the window and commits to Amy again because, eventually, he wants to. He wants to be with a psychotic, treacherous murderer. (For me, this was the biggest twist in the novel, not the reveal that Amy was alive.) Novel Nick is not a hero. Not even close. He embraces his final circumstances. Movie Nick is trapped by them, unfortunate victim of a black widow. Because of this, he is much less compelling.